Exploring Vancouver

The Architectural Guide

The only comprehensive handbook to Vancouver’s architecture—from the modest to the monumental.

"The reading is astounding. Harold Kalman and Robin Ward's text is as straightforward as John Roaf’s images. It also has enough wit to please the armchair reader and enough facts to make walks of Exploring Vancouver’s fourteen architectural districts time well spent." —Malcolm Parry, columnist for Vancouver Magazine and The Vancouver Sun

“Easily the most substantial, witty and fearless companion for touring the buildings/streets of Vancouver—all other guides are fly-bys.” —Architecture critic Trevor Boddy, curator of Vancouverism: Architecture Builds the City

Vancouver is still a young city, and its streetscapes and neighbourhoods reflect the city’s constant state of reinvention. New buildings adapt the latest global architectural trends to the regional context or express the distinct local West Coast style; heritage buildings stand for earlier eras and continuity. The result is a dynamic urban landscape. Highly readable and authoritative, this entirely updated edition of Exploring Vancouver is the definitive guide to the city’s architecture—from the breathtaking to the bizarre. Harold Kalman and Robin Ward, both longtime chroniclers of Vancouver’s architectural story, take the reader on a walking or driving tour of 14 areas in and around the city and detail more than 450 of the city’s most notable buildings, structures and landscapes—from the historical to the high-tech—situating each in its social, cultural and historical context.

Divided into 14 distinct city areas, with a full-colour photo accompanying each entry, Exploring Vancouver is a perfect companion for both curious visitors and the many architectural enthusiasts who are proud to call this city home.